Iran Must Not Have Nuclear Weapons? Why?

I mean this in all sincerity. Why is everyone so adamant that Iran getting a nuclear weapon would be the absolute worst thing on the planet? Don’t get me wrong; I think there should be NO nuclear weapons held by any country, but since 9 countries (1 of which still ‘pretends’ that they don’t) already have them, I’m not sure that they should have the right to dictate that other countries should not.

 

Perhaps a look into the past (although I know that might not be convenient to some, or relevant to others), would be required. America’s relationship with Iran is over two hundred years old. Much of that time, they were allies. Iran shared a border with what was then the USSR, and during the Cold War, that was of value to the US. Relations with England and the USSR were tense at the time, but America had their backs… as long as it was convenient to the US.

 

During WWII, Iran was a conduit for aid from the UK and US into Russia. It also was key in helping Polish refugees and Polish Armed Forces to escape ahead of invasion by the Axis countries, so much so that Stalin, Roosevelt, and Churchill issued the Tehran Declaration, guaranteeing both self rule and territorial rights for Iran.

 In 1953, however, Mohammad Mosaddegh was elected Prime Minister of Iran. The oil industry in the country had been nationalized just two years earlier, basically taking over the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company and slapping the UK in the face in the process. Britain wanted to retaliate, but good old Harry S Truman said no… until he said yes. Suddenly ‘Communism’ was too much of a threat, at least  to the oil industry there, and so MI6 and the CIA decided it was time for some regime change. Here is where the wheels come off.

To be fair, by this time, the US and UK were getting pretty handy at trying to force leadership changes in other countries – handy at trying, but not succeeding. The US reportedly tried to force regime changes 72 times just during the Cold War. So, what gives the US the right to think that they can just disregard the choices made by the people of a country, and override them, to the sole gain of the US? According to the Cline Center at the University of Illinois, 72 is just a drop in the bucket. They point to 350 coup attempts initiated by the US, 191 of them just since 1982.

So why, out of all the countries of the world, is the US so adamant that Iran cannot have nuclear weapons? Well, they have a cultist leader. Human rights mean not a lot to the Iranian leaders. Their administration is perhaps unstable. There is major corruption at the top. Now look at some of the countries who do have nuclear capabilities and tell me how they are any different than Iran. Russia, China, India, North Korea, and Israel all tick all of those boxes. The USA also does now.

 

There was an agreement with Iran to allow the rest of the world to monitor what they were doing, in an attempt to cool off hostilities, and as a small show of faith between two countries that have a tumultuous history, but that didn’t matter to the latest administration in America. Israel was the one to start bombing in Iran, just because they could, and because Netanyahu needs every distraction he can create while committing his plethora of hideous crimes and genocide, and the Orange Felon bought into it, hook, line, and sinker.

Be honest about this: the illegal bombing of Iran this last weekend was not about anything that Iran was doing. As Secretary of State Marco Rubio said, ‘Forget the intelligence.’ It was about two other governments who are horrible corrupt, who have leaders who are adjudicated criminals, who have created unmitigated disasters in their own countries, and will now resort to damned near anything just to save their own skins, and if they can line their pockets in the process, then so much the better. Creating this new global crisis has removed the scrutiny of their own illegality, their cruelty to their own people, the mountain of human rights violations they commit on a daily basis, their willingness to sacrifice human lives, and the environment, and world peace and stability, without batting an eye.

Perhaps our efforts are better spent on demanding (or forcing) regime change in Israel and the US, and leave Iran alone. The world would be a better place for it. Demanding that Iran go to the ‘negotiating table’ to hash out a penalty for crimes they have not yet committed, is no different than the rest of the world trying to ‘negotiate’ their way out of illegal tariffs that they never implemented. There is no negotiating with a lying madman.

BOILING IN OIL -- Pipelines and Politicians, If You Please

DATELINE: BOILING IN OIL -- As we wait for that great leader President Obama (aka Spineless Willie) to decide on the Keystone Pipeline, I thought it might be fun to throw some numbers at you. In the past twelve years, in the United States, there have been at least 82 known pipeline leaks. Now, that doesn’t seem like a lot, I suppose, but these are the ones where there was no human involvement to cause them, and these are just the pipelines that carried those elixirs of life – crude, diesel, gasoline and, in two cases, jet fuel. This does not include the ones that were hit by construction workers because the pipeline was plotted wrong on maps or by human error. These are just the suckers that woke up one morning and decided to let that precious lifeblood of a nation land on the ground.

82 leaks – little (or in some cases big) holes that sprung out of nowhere. Just 82, you are saying. Well, yes, but let me clarify this some more. For 11 of those 82, there are no estimates for how much product was lost, so when I say that considerably more than 209,024 barrels were spilled, it is based on only 71 of those leaks. This part you’ll love... I just KNOW it. Oil company talk is 209,024 barrels, but do you know why? Well, it’s because it is a whole lot less scary when they say that than when they say more than 8,778,997 gallons. Yes, that is almost 9 Million gallons of crap spilled, in just 12 years, from just little leaks that happen.

Now, I should be clear about this. These numbers are based on researching the leaks that are made known and are recorded in information on the internet. If anything, they are low-balled, perhaps a lot. Nonetheless, here is more information for you to chew on. Of those 82 leaks, at least 40 of them, so half, resulted in severe environmental damage and contamination, almost always of water sources, many times killing animals, sometimes resulting in evacuations, and sometimes, because that shit is incredibly flammable, causing fires when it ignites. In at least one case, the spill was so bad in the water, the oil company had to burn it off – yes, they set the damned lake on fire. I bet fish and fowl were totally thrilled with that.

Funnily enough, the name Enbridge, as owners of the pipeline, came up 9 times, and Kinder Morgan owned the pipeline 6 times. Even more surprising, while these leaks were spread out over 26 US states, 8 of them happened in Illinois. I bet a lot of oilmen don’t drink the water in that state. While Illinois takes the prize for the most pipeline leaks, it is followed closely by Texas, Oklahoma then California.

These leaks, it should be noted, have occurred many times in areas where they then contaminated major waterways. In several instances, huge numbers of fish and wildlife, including endangered wildlife, were killed – and it is a slow painful death for them. In many cases, these leaks happened in very environmentally sensitive areas, where there never should have been a pipeline in the first place.

Yes, we need cars. No one is so fucking dumb as to say otherwise. We need oil and gas, but we need the oil companies to be responsible. Up to now, they haven’t been. The only guide of any significance to them has a damned dollar sign in front of it. Some of these leaks went on for considerable time because they were small, but their damage was huge. Some of these leaks went unreported for a long time, so the oil companies could ‘hide’ it. There was absolutely NO consideration given to the fact that this contamination could kill more than environments or wildlife; it could kill people. We are gonna look a right asinine lot when we have cars to drive but not one drop of water to drink. Of course, Sarah ‘Blowhole’ Palin, Mitt ‘Who’ Romney, Newt ‘No Funny Nickname Required’ Gingrich, Michelle ‘Harpies Really Were Insane’ Bachman, et all, would have given any oil company the keys to a kingdom and a ticker tape parade – without one moment of consideration for the farmland, wetlands, water tables or homes that the pipeline would casually crash over with no regard for any form of organic life, including the fucking farmers. You see, oil companies are bullies at heart, because their only concern is the money. As for the jobs, take it from someone who knows – they will be there, for a year, maybe, but not as many as they say. Then they will suddenly disappear, and the oil company won’t give a flying fuck about anyone who was promised anything, including a job and great pay. We’re talking politicians and oil companies here. Never ever forget that.

But Mz Palin and friends bring me to another point – it’s not just the oil companies who cannot be trusted. The governments have made it more than clear they would sell out their own fucking children for one vote or a few campaign dollars. The pipeline going through the US now could well mean enough money for the Democrats to purchase the White House deed for decades to come. We are supposed to trust the very same organization that slipped the god damned Monsanto Protection Act through the process to become a law without anyone knowing it? Oh, wait... that happened ‘anonymously’*. The politicians sold out our entire farming community AND our entire food supply to one company, and now they say they have no idea how that happened? I can tell you how. Monsanto is run by bullies with money – the worst sort of human excrement on the planet. They made it legal for Monsanto to do whatever it bloody well wants with our food, genetically modify it and genetically engineer it using sheep crap to make beef steaks, and there is absolutely NO recourse for anyone. They have been given a permanent golden Get Out Of Jail free card and our entire food supply was the cost. We want to sell out the water supply to the oil companies? I suppose at this point in time, why the hell not.

Yes, we need oil and gas. We also need to find ways to NOT need oil and gas. We need that oil and gas to be transported safely. That doesn’t mean that they just bulldoze homes from people who don’t want the pipeline over their pristine land. It doesn’t mean that it goes over sensitive aquifers or through national wildlife reserves or national parks. The fact is, no matter what they fucking do to make it ‘totally safe,’ it is still made by humans and therefore is capable of accidental yet catastrophic failure. There needs to be strict guidelines for how they get their land and where they run their pipelines. There needs to be HUGE penalties for every god damned drop of product that lands in the air or on the ground – not some bullshit slap on the wrist. There needs to be absolute vigilance – not the relying on their state of the art computerized doodads that will protect us, because quite honestly, they fail as well, and when they do, with no human checks and balances, we are totally fucked.

So, Mister President, while you consider the pipeline – and the successful election of your democratic successor, because we KNOW that’s all the party is thinking about – give some thought to how the people have already been sold down the river – the grossly contaminated, undrinkable river. There will be oil for everyone, but there will be no one left to drive a damned car. While you’re at it, passing crap like the Monsanto Protection Act, perhaps you could come up with some new law that involves duct tape and Michelle Bachman’s gaping, stupid, idiotic maw. Now THAT would be a law worth some heavy campaign dollars.

It’s a time for responsible thinking, balance, logic and compromise. It is for this reason, I fear, that perhaps there is no hope, because these are words that don’t exist anymore in the power houses, ivory towers and hallowed halls of the United States of America. More’s the pity; it has become a living, breathing historical display of how empires crumble.


* The whole bullshit that is the anonymous inclusion of something in a bill being considered for legislation is probably the most lame-ass ignorant slap in the face to the voting public I have ever heard of, because there is no way in hell they don’t know how it got in there, but it’s just a whole lot more convenient to blame no one than be responsible and wear your convictions yourself. Shame on the entire political system for allowing this mountain of crappola to exist at all.